Efficiency of magnetite as nanocrystalline bulk catalyst for the reduction of 4-nitrophenol

Abstract Magnetite nanocristals were prepared via the co-precipitation technique. X-ray Diffraction, surface area measurements, Scanning Electron Microscopy/Energy Dispersive X-Ray Analysis and Temperature Programmed Reduction technique were used for the characterization of the prepared solids. Their catalytic performance was investigated in the 4-nitrophenol reduction. It has been found that the thermal preparation conditions strongly influenced the properties of the prepared samples. Hot co-precipitation leads to a decrease in catalytic performance regardless of the catalyst amount. The reaction duration decreases when increasing the catalyst amount. The catalytic behavior was directly related to the redox properties and the rate constant values were found to be significant in comparison with the literature data.